Coming home to roost

Film, Satyajit Ray once famously said, is a technological medium of expression developed by the western world. Its time boundedness makes it very difficult to imply that the characters that inhabit it are part of an unending continuum - that the film is but a vignette in the larger expanse that is its reality. Vetrimaaran's Aadukalam attempts, rather overtly, to transcend this limitation. Linguistic and spatial characteristics that are uniquely Madurai form a large part of the first half which, in hindsight, plays out as a preamble for the film Vetrimaaran wanted to make. This portion of the film lies squarely on the shoulder's of Dhanush and he displays a lightness of character that belies this onus. He flits around with great ease as a carefree youngster whose only concern is the rooster he raises and the man who taught him how.  The eco-system that Vetrimaaran constructs for his caharacters is one of rigid hierarchy where each level exercises power over the its inferiors through an exasperating mix of guilt and gratitude. Obvious similarities are drawn between rooster and  master, with both of them depicted as creatures of honed instinct - quick to anticipate and react to external threats but ill equipped to fight the internal conflicts. The film truly begins when the highest level in the hierarchy externalizes its insecurities with disastrous consequences for every level below it.

It isn't often that we see a protagonist expend energy as an unwitting pawn in the internal conflict of another character. We are often too close to what is bad for us. Karuppu is obviously not the sharpest tool in the box. He literally needs to be clubbed on the head with information before he realises who is pulling the strings. In what is the true hallmark of institutionalization Karuppu is not concerned that there are strings. As a puppet he embraces the strings that make him dance. As the second half of the film unfolded I could not resist comparing the films essence with a film that dealt with the issue far more subtly and effectively - Bharatham. The essence of both films lies in the natural resistance to evolution from within the ecosystem and the human inability to deal with it amicably. Now all Vetrimaaran has to do is find some of the subtlety that Sibi and Lohi showed.